PTL! I Have a Bike Again!

You heard right. It took me five or six visits to Asheville Recyclery downtown over the course of 15 days, but last Friday, for the first time in 14.5 years, I rode a bike – and have every day since. I can't really handle more than about a quarter mile right now, but I'm definitely making progress. We've also started bowling every Wednesday afternoon again.

When my pain spiked up again after my surgery last May, I started to lose hope. Apparently the problem was just that the muscles and other tissues that used to have to accommodate my fusion hardware are struggling to adjust to it no longer being there.

But now, after four months of physical therapy, I'm almost completely free from the sharp, stinging pain that used to plague me, and only have to deal with the more diffuse pain that will likely plague me the rest of my life. My therapist is sure I'll be going back to work soon, but I'd rather wait until I've been able to back off my pain meds (I'm still taking three different ones).

I wanted to attach a picture of me riding, but Blogger is being persnickety and won't let me upload it, but those of you on facebook have already seen it anyway. Some of my Picasa configuration files decided not to get backed up off my old laptop, but fixing that is one of my goals for the week. After that I'll upload both pics of me on my bike to my Picasa album and link it here from there.